Jafar Panahi's Taxi

The camera is a conversation catalyst. One gentleman says it must be an anti-theft device and that to crack down on theft, the state should hang a couple thieves to make an example. A woman in the backseat cannot believe this man is so quick to declare death and says they must get to the root of the problem; nobody is born a thief. Back and forth they go, set off by a camera.

Many folks nowadays install dashboard cameras in their cars to shield themselves from schemers and record any and all mayhem taking place in front of them. A dashboard camera recorded the best view of the meteor which took out of chunk of Chelyabinsk, Russia in 2013 and I’ve seen any number of crazy car and motorcycle accidents caught on these cameras later posed online. Iranian director Jafar Panahi is not interested in recording the surrounding traffic or capturing would be tricksters. He turns the camera around to stare at his taxi’s passenger seats. Want to learn about what is going on in any given city in the world? Hop into one of its taxis and just listen.

Panahi edits Taxi as if it is a real time documentary. People on the street seem to jump in and out of his cab at random. Several passengers notice he’s not a very good taxi driver though; he gets lost, has only vague clues about how to drive to major landmarks, and frequently gets corrected by his passengers. The earlier man who wants the government to execute a couple thieves is incredulous at what a lousy taxi driver Panahi is.

Panahi is relatively well known in his native land and he gets recognized. A man who makes his living selling bootlegged and illegal DVDs unmasks him. He witnessed the man and woman explode at each other and convinces himself they are actors and Panahi is making a movie. Why else would a famous director point a camera inwards and drive a taxi? Why indeed. This underground DVD merchant represents a slice of culture and art Iran’s theocracy attempts to deny its citizens. He knows what he is doing is shady and underhanded but how can an audience refute his ironclad logic when he declares, “Without me, no more Woody Allen.”

Boom! A motorcycle accident victim is thrown in the backseat with his wailing wife asking for a cell phone camera so he may make his last will and testament. If he does not record his will, his wife will inherit nothing under the law and his brothers will take it all. Cultural censorship, medieval laws ready to throw women into poverty at the dent of a motorcycle, and more overt situations concerning random incarceration and harassment are only some of the themes Panahi explores driving around talking to Tehran commuters.

Known for showcasing a realistic Iran, just about all of Jafar Panahi’s films are banned in his own country. The government has arrested him twice, the second time for 86 days finally being released after going on a hunger strike, a story referenced in the film. He was given a 20-year ban on filmmaking, screenwriting, giving interviews, and traveling outside Iran. Perhaps this is why there are no credits attached to this movie, for everyone’s protection.

Winner of the Berlin Film Festival’s Golden Bear, its highest award, Taxi is utterly captivating. Yes, despite appearances, the passengers and conversations are all scripted, but if I didn’t tell you that, you would probably be convinced all of these events occur in real time. Panahi is not screaming against his oppressors, he is trying to have a conversation with them. Iranian censors ban ‘sordid realism’ from all of their films. I am going to assume these frank taxi conversations will qualify as sordid realism because they break a cardinal rule censors despise, they tell the truth.